"No country in Southeast Asia has experienced more intense political, economic and social changes over the past five years than Myanmar. The changes are evident in everything from the Yangon skyline to ubiquitous mobile phone use, from the COVID-19 response to televised debates of parliament. Despite this, opportunities to quantify broad political, social and economic change remain relatively rare in Myanmar. The Asia Barometer Survey seeks to fill this gap. Its new report details the findings of a nationally representative survey of 1,620 respondents carried out in September and October 2019 through face-to-face interviews across the 14 states and regions (excluding conflict zones). Significantly, this report is able to compare public perceptions and political behaviour against an earlier study conducted in Myanmar in 2015, and also see how Myanmar fares against other countries in Southeast Asia, including Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam (Cambodia and Singapore surveys are ongoing this year). The latest survey reveals an often contradictory but overall worrying picture of democracy in Myanmar. First, though, let’s start with the good news: There has been a significant rise in confidence in political institutions, from the parliament and judiciary to the election commission and police force. This higher trust in political institutions across the board is accompanied by greater confidence in the capacity of government to address the problems Myanmar is facing. In all of the ABS research over the past 20 years, no other country in the 14 East Asian countries/territories surveyed has seen such an increase in institutional trust in such a short period of time. The chart below shows that positive views of trust by institution over the two surveys..."